Prior to the advent of digital photography most photographic images were stored as negatives and/or as image prints. To assist in maintaining a library of images index prints, comprising a small print of each photograph from a film on a single sheet, were often produced. With the advent of digital photography, and the ability to scan photographs and store them electronically even if taken using traditional methods, the storage options have increased dramatically.
In many cases whole libraries of photographs are simply stored on the hard discs of computers, whilst in other cases they are stored on removable storage media, such as floppy discs or CDs. However, this often means a very large number of the removable storage media, particularly when floppy discs are used and, when a user wishes to locate a particular image and print a copy of it, finding it can be problem. If there is a collection of index prints relating to the library which provides the location of the stored image file then at least it is simply a question of going to the correct location and printing the image. However, in many cases image prints have not been made and the user has to look through the stored images (most conveniently using appropriate software to run a slide show of them) to identify which one is required.
One approach that has been described for use with recorded digital images is to provide an index sheet which includes thumbnails of the images and associated selection fields. Manual mark up of the selection fields is followed by scanning of the marked up index sheet to trigger an appropriate action (printing, storage, retrieval etc.) of the associated thumbnail. The index sheet is hence an interface to enable effective access to electronic data stored elsewhere.
It would be desirable to provide an alternative way to store and select images, such as photographic images, which was better adapted to a range of user requirements.